Query: Liberia / Development of National Human Rights Action Plans / Comparative Experiences

[Facilitator’s Note: Please find below contributions from Fernando Mora UNDP Mauritania and Thord Palmlund to the Query from UNDP Liberia on National Human Rights Action Plans. This query is cross-posted between the HURITALK Network and CPRP-networks]

Fernando Mora, UNDP Mauritania wrote:

I would like to share this short list with you. I think that it is important to:

1. Organise a national seminar in order to speak about the need to have a national human rights action plan;

2. Set up a steering committee representing all the institutions of the State and the civil society (should be composed of high level officials – ministers from the government side and important activist from the civil society);

3. Get a national and local picture about the human rights situation of the country by organizing seminars and round tables at those levels;

4. Prepare a paper about the national and local consultations to be discussed with the steering committee in order to decide new actions as:

a. Back to the field (regions or departments) and organise by zones/regions public hearings about the goal on having an action plan and to share the results of the first consultations asking the people what they think. It is crucial to give the floor to the people (local NGOs and administrations should be involved);

b. Make a clear list of goals that you want to achieve doing such public hearings (prepare a first draft on the human rights needs at the national and regional level …);

c. Base in the results organise national and local seminars on civil, political, economic and … human rights in order to better explain what human rights means;

d. Prepare a list of questions in order to complete the results of the consultations and to send around the country;

e. Prepare a first base line report;
f. And so on.

5. To prepare a first base line report for discussion: before this stage you had already decided who is responsible to write it (the national action plan should be a national plan make by nationals – not matter if is not as some international organizations would like). Also the most important thing is that the plan corresponds to the needs of the country..;

6. You could work with experts (one international for one year could be a good idea. His/her role is to support the preparation of the action plan not to write it). Have a look to what have been done by the New Zealand (it is an excellent example).

I hope it is useful. I am a former advisor to CoE Commissioner for Human Rights and former Advisor to the East Timor Prime Minister.

All my best,

Fernando Mora (M.)
Democratic Governance Advisor
to UNDP Resident Representative and
United Nations Country Team Resident Coordinator
Mauritania


Thord Palmlund, UNDP New York wrote:

Dear Bipin,

The experience of HURIST in not fully up to date but maystill be relevant and I attach a study made a years ago presenting the experience of HURIST. HURIST was the joint UNDP/OHCHR programme to support the integration of human rights in the operations of UNDP. It supported the development of National Human Rights Action Plans in six countries, including two in West Africa, Cape Verde and Mauritania. The lesson learning document focuses on the plans in Lithuania, Moldova and Mongolia. As the study stresses, there is reason to consider seriously, before the start, whether the NHRAP offers the best approach to improve the human rights situation in a country.

Good luck in your endeavours!

Thord Palmlund
Formerly HURIST Coordinator in UNDP

Dear Bipin, after discussion with Emilie, the HR Network facilitator, we will be fine to post the query with some explanation. She has given her thoughts below. Perhaps you would be able to elaborate a bit more on the objectives of the NH Action plan (objectives, background info on the project). We thought to put an note at the end of the query so that people who have seen the query before will know that you are aware of the past query. Let us know what you think.

Best regards, Misaki Watanabe
March 21, 2007

Dear Bipin, please find attached the report on the experiences of Lithuania on HR Action Plans: http://www.undp.org/oslocentre/docsjuly03/TomasBaranovas.pdf. I will also try contacting Tomas Baranovas to get a direct response from him. I know that it is not the right region but some lessons learned might also be useful for the Liberia context.

Best, and good weekend,

Emilie Filmer-Wilson
March 30, 2007

From: bounce-1078992-148874@groups.undp.org [mailto:bounce-1078992-148874@groups.undp.org] On Behalf Of Bipin Adhikari
Sent: Friday, March 23, 2007 4:06 PM
To: humanrights-talk@groups.undp.org; cprp-net@groups.undp.org
Subject: [cprp-net] Query: Liberia / Development of National Human Rights Action Plans / Comparative Experiences

[Facilitator’s Note: This query is cross-posted between the Human Rights Talk Network and CPRP-networks]

Dear colleagues,

The Ministry of Justice in Liberia is working with the UNDP and UN Mission here to develop a national human rights action plan for Liberia.* Such an action plan was envisaged by the Joint Needs Assessment concluded by the United Nations and the World Bank for the National Transitional Government of Liberia in 2004 to rebuild this country after a long civil war. The result-focused transition framework (RFTF) developed to implement the Joint Needs Assessment provided for a three year National Human Rights Action Plan (NHRAP) for Liberia. The exercise is still at its early stages. We would appreciate receiving from members any recent/previous experiences on processes, lessons learnt, human rights action plans, within and outside of the region and particularly within a post conflict context. Apart from using them for our own references, we will also be sharing these resources with concerned human rights focal points in the Ministries and civil society organizations.

Looking forward to hearing from you,

Bipin Adhikari
United Nations Mission in Liberia (UNMIL)
# 404A, Pan-Africa Plaza
Monrovia, Liberia

* Please note that the knowledge networks handled a query on the same subject in 2005: Liberia/ Comparative Experiences/ Development of national human rights action plans in post-conflict contexts However, the work on the NHRAP in Liberia was stalled for various political/technical reasons. As there sure has been new developments, we would like to get recent updates on experiences, especially in the West African region.